Do you recommend Romance of the Three Kingdoms IX?

I'm currently playing my 3rd scenario within the last month. Liu Bei is possibly the worst AI controlled ruler I've experienced.

I've been doing my own forces with created officers, first scenario was 194 or 197. Whichever one where Luo Yang is empty and Liu Bei starts in Xiao Pei. He didn't do a damn thing. Just built up troops the whole game while everyone else took cities around him. Never attacked target rulers when coaltions were formed. Eventually things came to be where there was a coalition against Sun Ce ( I never join them), and he and I were Amicable. Well he finally did something, taking Shou Chun, Lu Jiang, and Mo Ling. He quickly loses the first two and Xiao Pei, at which point I betrayed him and took Mo Ling to finish him.

Out of spite, the next scenario, 200, I executed he and his two brothers for the above ineptitude.

Third scenario, 211, he allies with both Sun Quan and Cao Cao (why?), and starts to target me. I had started in Yun Nan and took Yi province. I eventually wiped him out, and was intending to hire all his officers while they were imprisoned then once again execute him and Guan Yu and Zhang Fei. He brilliantly had a compound built in Nanhai, near Shan Yue where most of his military officers became free.

I'd like to bring up ROTK IX again, since it's my favorite of the series.

IX was the first one I played, and so will likely be special among them all for that reason. Besides that, I think it's very good among the ROTK games, stronger than X and XI for sure (I've only played minutes of XII). The battle system (one map all the time) works most of the time, although I have the occasional want to send a unit through a different path than the one the AI chooses. A mod or change that would allow you to issue orders to units (but only during the strategy phase), such as having a unit stop and hold position at an important chokepoint in anticipation of an attack, or follow a different path of attack (recreate Deng Ai's capture of Cheng Du) would be gold.

The cut scenes are amazing; this is what ROTK cut scenes should be. That kind of art style (tell me if you know what it's called!) is absolutely beautiful. The voice-overs, despite being in Chinese (which I don't speak), are also solid. Watching the assassination of Dong Zhuo or the event where an emperor climbs Mt. Taishan to pray to the gods are pretty powerful, and will stay with you.

I generally like the tactics system. I especially like skills like Dismantle or shield, which allow even poor officers to play an important part in a battle. When you're going up against Jia Xu attempting to use a trap on you, having some useless political officer who happens to know dismantle will save you a big headache. I find that weaker tactics tend to activate more often (especially for the AI), so even guys using sortie have a chance against Lu Bu fielding onslaught tactics.

Multiple endings are a plus for me in any game. It's hard as balls to get the best endings (best domestic and best expansionist) unless you look at a guide. It's immensely satisfying to see your kingdom do well after the game ends, and beyond your ruler's lifespan. It's also depressing to see your Prime Minister attempt to usurp power, causing another civil war just after your death. Damn you, Sima Yi (actually happened to me).

IX requires a different mindset from the others. The RPG system is fun (really, it is! I love 7 and 8), but IX really is a strategy game. A few additional features (like random events aside from searches) would make it more immersive and also appeal to others who want to feel like they're in the setting. ROTK VIII did this. The occasional random event (helping a commoner when trying to improve domestic stats, or on observes), as well as a ton of events that might pop up by surprise if you don't know the conditions (my first marriage was this way). Taking a cue from VIII would have been fantastic and immensely improved the immersion here.

IX isn't prefect - no ROTK I've played is - and it has its flaws. But it's easily my favorite of the series, and it gets enough right that I can't help but favor it over other games. When I want Three Kingdoms strategy, I turn to IX.

It's also my favorite of the series. My PS2 has seen more action then my xbox one over the last month plus because I've been playing IX

One of the things I think it has over XI is the battle system. Sure it's nice to control where your units go and what they attack with, but not being able to control what tactics trigger when and where in IX brings a nice unknown element to the game. 60s INT confuses your 90 INT unit? Frustrating as hell but a nice wrench in the plans.

Not to mention the usefulness of officers. I don't ever recall using guys like Lu Kuang, Lu Xiang, Cai Zhong (and the other Cai dude, not Cai Mao) in XI, but they are useful in IX with skills like Mounted and Volley.

I still don't understand Navy experience. I'm starting to think it has nothing to do with triggering navy tactics because I just had a turn where 10 of my officers in 2 units, with actual Naval skills, did not trigger a single tactic against one unit with zero naval skills, yet they triggered 4.

There seem to be two Zhao Yuns in IX. The first is Zhao Yun when I'm fighting him, where he throws out tactics every three days and can fight a duel against three warriors with higer War than him and beat two of them (actually happened).There's also Zhao Yun working for me. He uses tactics once a month when he's in a good mood, and loses duels to anyone whose War is not at least six or seven points below him. I call it the "Zhao Yun curse". This game, which gives you less control over your officers in battle, allows him to truly show the depths of his feelings towards me.I also know that Lu Meng loves me.

Gray Riders wrote:There seem to be two Zhao Yuns in IX. The first is Zhao Yun when I'm fighting him, where he throws out tactics every three days and can fight a duel against three warriors with higer War than him and beat two of them (actually happened).There's also Zhao Yun working for me. He uses tactics once a month when he's in a good mood, and loses duels to anyone whose War is not at least six or seven points below him. I call it the "Zhao Yun curse". This game, which gives you less control over your officers in battle, allows him to truly show the depths of his feelings towards me.I also know that Lu Meng loves me.

Sounds legit. I've noticed the same with some officers of mine too...they just can't seem to use tactics effectively or win duels, even when they should. I know there's a stat that existed in ROTK VIII (something like "activity") that defines how often/effectively AI officers use their abilities and have abilities like probe work in their favor when the RNG is involved.

I'm almost certain that same system was transferred to IX and affects how often officers use tactics. Lu Xun, for instance, has very low "activity", so he isn't really as effective as his stats would indicate. Meanwhile other middling officers (like Cao Hong, I think) have high "activity", and so are more effective than their stats indicate, due to high tactic rate.

Could be that a similar thing exists when checking if an officer works for a human or not. Particularly on advanced. Inferior enemy officers getting 2 or 3 criticals in a duel (that of course lower your WAR) stomping your clearly better officer really, really sucks. Bonus sympathy if your guy gets captured.

Bush Leagues wrote:Sounds legit. I've noticed the same with some officers of mine too...they just can't seem to use tactics effectively or win duels, even when they should. I know there's a stat that existed in ROTK VIII (something like "activity") that defines how often/effectively AI officers use their abilities and have abilities like probe work in their favor when the RNG is involved.

I'm almost certain that same system was transferred to IX and affects how often officers use tactics. Lu Xun, for instance, has very low "activity", so he isn't really as effective as his stats would indicate. Meanwhile other middling officers (like Cao Hong, I think) have high "activity", and so are more effective than their stats indicate, due to high tactic rate.

Could be that a similar thing exists when checking if an officer works for a human or not. Particularly on advanced. Inferior enemy officers getting 2 or 3 criticals in a duel (that of course lower your WAR) stomping your clearly better officer really, really sucks. Bonus sympathy if your guy gets captured.

I remember a discussion about an "acitivity" stat on Gamefaqs years ago, with Lu Xu and Cao Hong used as examples. I haven't personally had much trouble with Lu Xun being lazy, though Cao Hong has surprised me with how active he seems at times. I have a theory that warrior types seem to use tactics more in general, which could be why I have good luck with officers like Lu Meng and Jiang Wei using Confuse or Trap more often than Zhuge Liang or Sima Yi. I do wonder how many "hidden" attributes officers have, aside from stuff in every game like ambition, virtue, and the compatibility number.For instance, I've read that Gan Ning is worse at dueling than his War indicates, while I've noticed Zhou Tai often seemed to fight even better than that 93 War would suggest.

I'm fairly sure the AI gets some sort of tactic use advantage on Advanced, though it would be weird if they did make it vary between officers. Zhao Yun is the one top officer that always disappoints me; I've never had such consistant underperformance from the other Tigers or Lu Bu.

oh, your duel story reminded me. It would have been really nice to have an option for your units to avoid duels. Like they already have options for your unit to pursue a retreating one, engage one if they encounter one, etc. Just tack on the option to avoid duels. I like to load up my units with 5 officers, not always with great war, so that would have been nice. Even when they have good war I still sometimes don't want them to. Deng Ai, while serving me, once got Jia Xu in to a duel. I'm pretty sure Jia Xu isn't going to do that..ever. And it was the 2nd duel those two units had that turn. Lowering their morale so far and making them retreat with over 10k troops doesn't serve me well when my tower unit is wailing on the city. Just trigger a friggin tactic.